Use of Engineered Wood Poses Benefits, Dangers

AvalonBays Falls Churchlocation, on the edge of Falls Church City, is one of several developments under construction that uses engineered wood and lightweight construction materials. Another of AvalonBays developments in Edgewater, N.J., which also uses engineered wood, was destroyed in a January fire. (Photos: Drew Costley/News-Press)

One of the trends in real estate construction over the last 30 years has been the use of engineered wood and other lightweight construction materials in the building of the structures that house residences, including apartments, and businesses. The advantages to using these materials engineered wood trusses and I-joists used to build a houses roof and floors are that they are environmentally-friendly and cheaper because less wood is needed to constitute these building supplies.

But while this form of construction is completely legal, a tradeoff highlighted by a January fire in Edgewater, N.J. that, according to The New York Times, displaced more than a 1,000 residents of an apartment complex built using engineered wood and other buildings surrounding the complex is that fires in structures built using engineered wood spread faster. And the structures themselves are more prone to structural collapse.

Out of the two major developments in Falls Church City Rushmarks Harris Teeter building going up on West Broad Street and Lincoln Properties The Reserve at Tinner Hill only The Reserve at Tinner Hill is using engineered wood, according to the Citys building inspector Doug Fraser. The Harris Teeter building is a concrete structure.

Another development on the edge of the City, Avalon Falls Church on S. Spring Street, also uses engineered wood, according to construction workers on the site. The property is owned and being developed by AvalonBay, the same company that owned the Avalon at Edgewater complex that was torched in the aforementioned January fire. That complex was also built with engineered wood, according to The Times account of the fire.

Fraser noted in an interview with the News-Press that structures built with engineered wood can be more easily compromised in a fire. If you take an I-joist and burn two inches off the I-joist youve lost most of the structural capacity of that I-joist, Fraser said.

So that worries fire guys. If you get a real big house with I-joists and you have a fire in there it doesnt take as much fire to compromise some of the structure of a houses floor system or a roof system.

Falls Church Citys fire marshal Tom Polera said that most fire folks hate the use of engineered wood, and it has changed how firefighters train and prepare for their job, in addition to changing how they fight actual fires.

Its whats being used in most construction nowadays. It became very popular in the 1980s and 1990s, Polera said. The problem with it is it reduces the time capability of the structure being able to withstand a fire when exposed to heat and fire and more of a potential for collapse.

He went on to explain more about the difference of fighting fires in structures made with engineered wood versus dimensional lumber, a material used in older homes.

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Use of Engineered Wood Poses Benefits, Dangers